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Tuesday, April 28, 2020

A bunch of researchers from a bunch of US universities finds out that the timing of American robins' (Turdus migratorius) "spring migration to [their] Arctic-boreal breeding grounds"(P) got 12 days earlier in the last 20 years (about 5 days per decade in the 1998-2018 time period).

Moreover, the brains analyze data collected between 2016-2018 from GPS tracking devices stuck on the backs of 55 American robins. And these data indicate that "the [American robins'] arrival timing and likelihood of stopovers, and timing of arrival to
breeding grounds" (P) are highly impacted by the environmental conditions the birds find along their migratory paths. Among the factors, the "dynamics in snow
conditions" (P) appear to be a key one.

The researchers' study (P) is published on the journal Environmental Research Letters and can contribute in creating predicting models of birds' responses to climate change.

The findings are coherent with what scientists already know, which is that one of the strongest effects of "global climate change has been the advancement of spring at high northern latitudes [...] where temperatures are rising nearly two to three times faster than the global average" (P),
and that migratory birds adjust their trips' schedule to their breeding
territories in response to the changes in local climate.

But, dear reader, this dumb blog has an alternative explanation for the earlier migration's timing of American robins. And a cartoon to explain it.

And the brains find out that the pink birds have pretty intense social lives, that the larger their flocks the more frequent their social behaviors, that "arrangements of dyads, trios and quartets with higher ties strengths were visible [with both] male-male and female-female [stable over time]bonds", and, ultimately, that "flamingo societies are complex (i.e. formed of long-standing preferential partnerships and not loose, random connections)" (P).

So, dear reader, for you and you only, this dumb blog, in the two following cartoons, respectively reports a truth that the good researchers failed to uncover (A), and a common example of what the intense social life those cool flamingos have looks like (B).

Thursday, April 2, 2020

So, dear listener, a bunch of researchers do a study(P) on the effects of cat-specific musicon the felines' stress level when the furry pets go to the veterinary.

And the scientists find that: "cat-specific music can significantly lower stress-related behaviors in
cats visiting the veterinary clinic for wellness examinations. Adding
cat-specific music to veterinary offices as environmental enrichment
could provide great value to the cat’s welfare in the clinic" (P).The cat-specific music the scientists refers to is "purring and suckling sounds[...] layered into tempos and frequencies used in feline
vocalization music" (P).

But, dear reader, this dumb blog in the following cartoon is showing you the real nature of the "cat-specific music" the cats find so relaxing.

Thursday, March 26, 2020

Science knows since a while that, in Eastern Europe, there're man (hunters-gatherers) made circlular structures "built" with mammoth' bones associated with "artefact assemblages" (P). These features date back to across the Upper Palaeolithic (i.e. 22 - and more - thousands years ago) (P).

They consist of a ring of mammoth bones with a diameter of various meters usually surrounded by "a series of large pits" thought to have been used for "the storage of food or bone fuel, rubbish disposal or simply as quarries for loess used to construct the [very same] features"(P).

The structures are commonly reckoned as "to be the remains of dwellings that offered shelter during long, full glacial winter seasons or possibly year round" (P).

A recent researchon a freshly dug out structure, though, challenges that viewin a way supporting alternative hypothesis, like that that sees the mammoth-bones circles being "monumental architecture or possible ceremonial features" (P).The studied mammoth-bones circle with a diameter of 12.5 meters (41 feet), indeed, has no obvious entrance and shows a "relative scarcity of minute debitage[that]seems incongruous for a putative dwelling"(P).

The feature is located at the already famous (for this kind of structures) Kostenki 11 site (aka Anosovka 2) which is close to the Don River, near the city of Voronezh, in the European south-western Russia (51°23′08′′ north, 39°03′05′′ east) (P).Said that, dear reader, this dumb blog has its own hypotesisabout how and why the mammoth-bones circles have been made by humans. See the following cartoon.